Saturday, December 22, 2012

This was originally written 2/12/08 as an assignment for a writing group.

An Unwanted Wanted Gift

By Maxine Hennis

When
I was small, we didn’t get lots of Christmas presents like children do these
days.We had a stocking filled with
fruit and nuts and some little pieces of candy.We usually got maybe one or two presents.When I was about 10, I was enthralled with
the idea of having majorette boots and a baton.I pictured myself strutting around, throwing my baton away up in the air
and catching it without a hitch.

I
also spent many hours at my little school room type desk my mom had found for
me somewhere.I loved to draw and went
through lots of paper.I saw a small
personal sized blackboard in a store and then and there…that was my favorite
and utmost desire.I could spend lots of
time drawing and not waste all that paper.So that became another thing I wanted very badly.I obviously voiced these desires to family
members over and over.Then…

The
Christmas tree was set up in the living room of the big old two-story rock
house where we lived.About a week
before Christmas, I saw it!It was a box
about 3 feet by 2 ½ feet by about 4 inches.I just knew there was a blackboard in there.I was so happy, so excited,and so impatient for the day to come when we
could open our presents.

Finally
it was Christmas morning.I could hardly
contain my excitement.Finally, it was
my turn to open my present.I turned it
around and around, shook it, and, then I opened it.I opened one end and peeked in.I could see nothing, especially anything that
looked like a blackboard.There were
newspapers stuffed in the box and I began pulling the pieces out, one at a
time.I couldn’t reach the papers
anymore so I turned the box over and opened the other end.There was something wrapped in Christmas
paper.It was about 18 inches long, had
two heads on it, and was solid.To my
incredible surprise, there was a baton!I was so thrilled and disappointed at the same time.I can never explain how I felt, betrayed,
foolish because they had tricked me, happy to have a baton, but deeply hurt
that I didn’t get the blackboard.Several minutes later my oldest sister brought in another gift for
me.It was the blackboard.

This might be a good time to share my suspicions.My oldest sister, who was probably in her
early 20’s, was kind of a rascal.I have
always suspected it was her idea to deceive me, thinking it would be
funny.Obviously the blackboard came in
the box but they used the box to hide the baton.Seems funnier as an adult but it seemed
really mean to me at that time.

I played with the baton a lot the first few weeks, then
occasionally.I learned to twirl it,
move it from hand to hand in the middle of a twirl, and to toss it in the air
and catch it.However, I spent countless
hours playing with that blackboard.That
was the favorite gift I ever received as a child.When I outgrew it, I gave it to a nephew, who
played with it a lot, too.Was that gift
comparable to an Ipod now?It’s hard to
imagine a child these days getting that much pleasure out of a blackboard and a
box of chalk.